Buddhism and Christianity

BuddhismBuddhism and Christianity have some slight similarities, but are vastly different in respect to the spiritual perspective and approach to healing. Buddhism does not necessarily encompass a spiritual perspective and is based on The Four Noble Truths set forth by founder, Siddhartha Gautama. Gautama achieved self-salvation through meditation and had an epiphany about how to be free of suffering. In doing so, he became the “Enlightened One” and was hence known as the Buddha. The truths revolve around suffering and are: the truth of suffering, the truth of the cause of suffering, the truth of the end of suffering, and the truth of the path that leads to the end of suffering. The Buddha's Four Noble Truths can be said to be a type of formula for healing. In these truths is the recognition of the cause of suffering, and the path that treats the cause of the suffering. Suffering, physically or spiritually, can then be healed through prayer and meditation and achieving mental clarity on their way to Nirvana. Although prayer is also common in the Christian religion, achieving Nirvana is not. Buddhism’s spiritual perspective is only similar to Christian perspective because they use prayer as an approach to healing. However, a Buddhists prayer is more an inner prayer to achieve mental clarity for healing, and Christian’s prayer is to God. In both religions, the healing of the body is not just physical, but also spiritual. Both religions believe in physical healing by way of a spiritual connection, however, in Buddhism the body acts with the mind and in Christianity, the body acts with God. Buddhism is a seemingly individual religion that focuses on the person, their mind and their actions, with their health care approach mirroring this. “Buddhism asserts that for lasting healing to occur, it is necessary to heal not only the current disease with medicines and other forms of treatment, but also the cause of the disease, which originates from the mind.”...

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